


Herald of His Heart

by 1000001nights



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age II, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: F/M, Skyhold
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-19
Updated: 2015-08-19
Packaged: 2018-04-15 15:44:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,980
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4612308
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/1000001nights/pseuds/1000001nights
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes, urgent messages are relayed to Skyhold from the field. Sometimes, they're not so urgent, and sometimes, they're a bit more private than Cullen would like...</p>
            </blockquote>





	Herald of His Heart

"Commander Cullen. Urgent missive for you."

One of Cullen's lieutenants stood in the doorway of his office, a rolled paper in his hand, artfully tied with a piece of cloth. This was usual. It happened many times a day. What was unusual was the presence of Josephine Montilyet, and Leliana, both of whom rarely paid Cullen a visit in his office, and only when it was a matter of supreme importance. "What is it?" Cullen said, rising from his chair. "Is it important?"

"I was told to bring it to you straight away, commander," the lieutenant said. "It's from the Emprise."

"The Inquisitor?" Cullen said seriously. He tried to keep his excitement from showing. "Is something wrong?"

"As per your orders, I haven't read the missive, ser," the lieutenant replied dutifully. "Messages from the Inquisitor are to be delivered directly to - "

"Yes, yes, alright," Cullen said. He turned his attention from the lieutenant to Leliana and Josephine, who seemed far too giddy for such a routine message. "And who do I have to thank for bringing the two of you here?" he asked.

"The Inquisitor, I would say," Josephine said with a girlish smile. Leliana charmingly stifled a giggle behind her glove. "Or the Maker," the nightingale said, and Josephine joined her in a chorus of girlish giggles.

"What is the meaning of this?" Cullen asked.

"My agents received this message half an hour ago," Leliana continued. "It is in the Inquisitor's own hand. She sent it by raven from the Emprise, probably early this morning." 

"The Red Templars weren't expected to be much of a threat after the destruction of the red lyrium mine..." Cullen mused. "And there have been no reports of demons there for weeks. The rifts are closed... What could it be?" Leliana and Josephine shared an intimate look, and a quiet giggle. "Alright, what is this about? Did Sera put you up to this?" Cullen barked.

"No," Leliana smiled.

"We are merely reporting what the Inquisitor wrote," Josephine said, in her stately, diplomatic manner. Cullen eyed them, trying to size them up, to see what they were hiding. Leliana, ever the spymaster, gave nothing away, and Josephine was too well-practised in 'the game' to provide the commander with any clues as to their intentions. Whatever they were, however, Cullen knew he wasn't going to like it much.

"Is this Isabella's doing?" he asked suspiciously. Leliana and Josephine shared another look, and just as it seemed like they would burst into laughter, they turned their attention dutifully back to Cullen. "Who?" Leliana asked demurely. 

"Oh, the Rivaini pirate, I believe," Josephine replied, in the manner of a rehearsed play. "I have not seen her for days."

"That should trouble all of us more than seems to," Cullen said. He turned back to the lieutenant, who was waiting with the utmost respect, and a growing sense of awkwardness. Few but the Inquisitor herself were present at meetings of all three of the Inquisition's chief advisors. More than that, their casual conversation, and Cullen's obviously flustered mood, would be strange indeed to a lieutenant most suited to guarding a placeholder camp on the Storm Coast. "Very well," Cullen said, with a suspicious glance back at the two women, "read the message."

"Out loud, commander?" the lieutenant asked hesitantly.

"Yes!" Cullen barked, and made his way back behind his desk. "Promptly, please, I'm very busy." 

"Aye, ser." The lieutenant undid the fine knot around the message and unrolled it. Cullen hung his head over his desk and rubbed his forehead, hoping that Josephine and Leliana would leave when the message was read. When the commander raised his eyes to the room again, the lieutenant was petrified on the spot, the message unrolled before his eyes. Cullen barely registered Leliana and Josephine, but he was vaguely aware of them snickering by the door. "Well? Out with it man. Speak!"

"Ser..?"

"Go on, let's hear it. At once! Or I'll have you assigned to clearing gurguts in the Western Approach.” 

"Yes, commander," the lieutenant said, with a wary look from Cullen to the other advisors. As if steeling himself to face down a wyvern, the man took a deep breath, and continued. The message was short, but it seemed to take an age to get through it. From the first syllable, Cullen knew exactly why the women had come to hear it, and by the end, his face was burning a shameful shade of red. The lieutenant spoke well, and folded the paper into a neat roll when he was finished, hiding it guiltily behind his back.

 

"'Hello sweetie,'" the message began, "'I need your strong arms to build me a bridge. Signed, the herald of your heart.'" The lieutenant was practically shaking. "It also has a... um, a drawing. Of a heart. And some kind of small animal. It looks like... maybe a cat? But it seems to be wearing some kind of armour. In fact, it looks rather like your - "

 

"That's quite enough!" Cullen snapped awkwardly, his voice cracking, and Leliana and Josephine burst into laughter. The spymaster's voice tinkled like a series of choral bells, while Josephine's laugh was loud, crass, unrestrained and boisterous. The lieutenant handled himself well, all things considered, neither giving in to embarrassment, nor the desire to join the other advisors in their jest. Cullen, however, did not handle things as gracefully.

He rose angrily from his desk and stalked to the lieutenant's side, snatching the message from his hands. He looked it over, mostly to be sure it was real, and found the document genuine. There drawings were as reported, and the gently swooping writing was indeed that of the Inquisitor. He knew that Josephine and Leliana were aware of their relationship - it was impossible to keep anything from them - but he did not know how widely the knowledge was spread, and had done his best to keep it out of the minds of his troops. At least the other advisors had given him the courtesy to  _try_  to contain the story, but it was unlikely given the awkwardness of the situation. The tale would be the first thing on the lieutenant's lips after he got a drink in him. "So?" Josephine said expectantly. "Do you intend to grant your sweetie a bridge?"

"I don't - " Cullen started, but words failed him. "Are you  _sure_  Isabella had nothing to do with this?"

"I promise, we have seen no sign of her," Josephine said.

"She's hard to miss, that one," Leliana added. "This is all between you, and your sweetie."

"That's enough. I… I..." Cullen said.

"What will you tell the lady Inquisitor?" Josephine asked, a smile lingering on her lips. "I got the feeling she was... expecting a certain kind of response."

"I can have a raven back to her by midday tomorrow," Leliana said. "The message does seem rather urgent, after all."

"This came from the Emprise?" Cullen asked numbly.

"The Bone Tower camp," Leliana said, "near Judicael's Crossing. I assume that is the bridge in question."

" _Sweetie_ ," Josephine added. 

Cullen was fuming, but he knew better than to sink to retorts. The two women, skilled in the game and talented with words, would bury him if he tried to respond. Instead, he sighed, and turned his attention to the lieutenant. With as much commanding fury as he could muster given his flushed cheeks, Cullen pointed a finger at the officer and tried to make himself as clear as possible.

 "Any word of this leaves this office, and you and your detail will be cleaning the Arl's mabaris in the Hinterlands for the next year. Am I clear, lieutenant?"

"Y-yes ser," he stammered, though Cullen couldn't tell whether he was intimidated or trying to hold back laughter. He dismissed the lieutenant with a nod, and turned to the others. "And you two..." Cullen began, but all he could muster was a sigh. "Just... don't tell Varric. I don't want him writing this down."

"Oh, we wouldn't  _dream_  of it, commander," Josephine said gently, as if she were talking to her oldest friend.

"I'm sure Varric has more than enough of your escapades to fill a book or two," Leliana said.

"Yes, that's very comforting," Cullen said sarcastically. "I don't suppose I can dismiss you as easily, can I?"

"No," Josephine said, and she and Leliana laughed together again. "But we will go. I think the jest is over."

"If this had happened in Halamshiral, this would be the end of you," Leliana said. "Thank the Maker you were not so unlucky."

"I'll remember it in my prayers," Cullen replied exhaustedly, and sunk into his seat behind the desk. Leliana and Josephine left through the opposite door, taking the catwalk back towards the main hall. Cullen could have sworn he heard them giggling as they went, but tried not to think about it. He knew the story would be filtered through the ranks, but he only hoped his soldiers had the good grace not to parade their mockery in front of his face.

 

He turned back to his work, but couldn't bring his mind to focus on any of it properly. After a few minutes, he ground his forehead into his palms, and decided to finish up for the day. As he left his office, however, he noticed it wasn't embarrassment that was flushing his cheeks, it was something far kinder. He would have been much happier to have received that message in privacy, but even still, the thought of the Inquisitor brought a lingering smile to his lips, one he knew Leliana and Josephine would loved to have seen him wear.  _Let them laugh_ , he thought, and left his office.

 

***

 

It would be a week before Cullen would hear about the story again. He kept a close watch on his soldiers, lieutenants and captains for the next few days, but none gave any sign they knew, if in fact they did. He avoided Sera as best he could (though the effort was sometimes impossible), and kept an eye out for Isabella, who had been known to come and go from Skyhold sometimes without a word, but often with her hands full of stock from the larder, or with more valuable trinkets hidden somewhere else in her possession... When she seemed determined not to turn up, Cullen allowed himself to forget. It wasn't until after a banquet in the great hall, where he had sat at the head table on the Inquisitor's right side, that he was reminded.

She herself said nothing, of course. Their romance, for the time being, was meant to be their little secret. It was, perhaps unsurprisingly, Varric who brought the subject up again.

 

"Hey Curly," he asked, as the tables were being cleared, and the guests were filtering out of the hall, "when I inevitably take the time to write all this down, how would you like the Inquisitor to refer to you in the book? I heard somewhere that she likes to call you...  _sweetie_?"

Cullen froze. He did thank the Maker that night, that so few people were around to hear the dwarf's jibe. He pulled Varric aside as casually as he could manage, and beside the fire in the hearth by the door, he thrust a finger under the dwarf's broken nose. "You are not to speak another word about this, dwarf," he said. He took a step back off the wall, and Varric straightened his doublet. Cullen turned to leave, but when he was certain that no one was within earshot, he turned over his shoulder, and caught Varric's eye. "You're not to tell anyone, but... yes. That's... It's true."

"I don't even know if my readers will believe it, Curly," Varric said, raising his hands in supplication. Cullen turned quickly, and made his way out of the great hall as fast as he could.


End file.
